The oldest Orthodox congregation of
Russian Jews in the United States (founded in 1852).

1850 Gothic Revival building.

Originally built as a Baptist church,
converted to a synagogue in 1885.

During World War II, former Rabbi
Ephraim Oshry was the religious leader of the Kovno (Lithuania) Ghetto,
which is currently the core of a major exhibit and companion book at the
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.

Jacob Joseph, another former rabbi, was
the chief rabbi of New York at the turn of the 20th century, the only
chief rabbi in the city's history.

One of the first synagogues to gain New
York City Landmark status.

Building Condition and Repair Costs:

Roof and ceiling were destroyed by a
fire caused by electrical damage and the water damage from firefighter’s
hoses.

$250,000 must be raised to match a State
challenge grant.

Community Outreach:

Distributes food to the poor and visits
homebound and ill in the neighborhood.

Welcomes cultural/architectural heritage
tours through the Lower East Side Conservancy.

A five-story Gothic window was blown out in a
windstorm and destroyed at the historic Beth Hamedrash Hagodol synagogue
at 60 Norfolk Street on New York's Lower East Side. The wooden frame of
the window was rotten and cracked and cannot be salvaged.

The synagogue, built in 1850 as the Norfolk Street Baptist Church, has
been home to America's oldest congregation of Russian Jews since they
purchased the building in 1885 and moved from their previous quarters in
the old Welsh chapel on Allen Street. This synagogue, together with the
nearby Bialystoker Synagogue, is a reminder that American synagogues
were often housed in former churches, just as many new churches are
today housed in former synagogues.

The twin-tower synagogue is built in the Gothic Revival style. Much of the
original exterior decoration was removed long ago, but the interior is
still remarkable - combining original Gothic-Revival features and
Eastern European-inspired paintings of Holy Land landscapes and Biblical
scenes on the walls.

The New York Landmarks Conservancy's Endangered Buildings Fund has
contributed $2,500 to help pay for a temporary metal window, and they
helped obtained approval for the work from the New York City Landmarks
Preservation Commission which oversees all building work on sites, such
as Beth Hamedrash Hagodol, listed as New York City landmarks. The
congregation still needs $6,000 to help complete repairs on this
important building.

For information on making contributions for the window's repair contact
ISJM or Ken Lustbader, Sacred Sites Program, New York Landmarks
Conservancy, 141 Fifth Ave., New York, NY, 10010.

Eighth St. Shul is evicted - will be residential units
By: Lincoln Anderson

November 29, 2000

From left, artist Pete Missing, Ralph Feldman and Judy Josephs stand
outside E. Eighth St. Shul during shul’s eviction last Wednesday.The day
before Thanksgiving, a New York City deputy sheriff evicted a handful of
protestors from the Eighth St. Shul between Avenues B and C.
It was the apparent end of a court battle by the shul to get some kind of
ownership of the building - the last remaining synagogue in Alphabet
City - and to keep the original congregation from regaining possession.

"It's not a synagogue. They turned it into a flophouse," said Sidney
Turkeltaub, 78, the president of Congregation Bnei Moses Joseph
Zauechast and Zausmer, the name on the sign that still hangs above the
shul's door, as he arrived with East Village real-estate developer Bob
Perl last Wednesday morning before the deputy sheriff. The synagogue has
existed since the turn of the century. Turkeltaub has been the
congregation's president since 1959.

Perl plans to buy the building from the congregation for $425,000 and
convert it into a one- or two-family residence, possibly with some
commercial use. All the money will go to charities, Turkeltaub said.

A month ago an eviction order was issued, but a last-minute stay was
granted. Then, a second eviction order was issued prior to last
Wednesday's eviction.

As the deputy entered, a woman holding a white poodle and gold menorah
identified herself: "I'm the chairperson of the Eighth St. Shul. I have
been for the last eight years."

"That's fine, you guys have to leave," the deputy said.

"You have to give me a break to get my stuff together," said one of the
men. "I live here."

"No I don't," the deputy, Steven Burdman, said gruffly and the group of
five shuffled out onto the sidewalk.

A burning cigarette dangling from his lips as he left the shul, his
possessions slung over his shoulder, artist Pete Missing, 37, said he
was hired to restore the synagogue's paintings and has been living there
for four months. He said a month ago a court order put a stop on his
work.

Ralph Feldman, 65, a retired fireman who lives next door, and who put a
new roof on the shul and installed "over 100 beams" to keep it standing
and new plumbing, was hovering on the sidelines.

"They abandonned it," Feldman said, referring to the original
congregation. Asked why he decided to fix up the shul, Feldman said, "I
got inspired by God." Feldman added that he kept kosher while a prisoner
of war for 18 months during the Korean War. "I didn't eat any rats," he
said.

The shul's chairperson, Judy Josephs, an accountant who lives on St. Marks
Pl., said, "the congregation owns it. Now we're the congregation. We
davin [pray] here. We've been working on keeping a minyan. We're asking
the buyer, who is Jewish, where is he davining? We wouldn't have a
building if not for the current interest."

Josephs said the building is called a "stiebel shul - it means it's like
in an old house." For the last three years, Josephs said, her group has
been running "interim minyans" when they managed to gather the required
10-person quorum, and Rosh Hashanah and Chanukah services.

Joshua Whalen, a local tenant activist, got in a face-off with Perl.

"You're a whore!" he yelled in Perl's face.

"You're a moron!" Perl yelled back.

"Are you going to re-open the shul?" Whalen asked.

"I'm not answering," Perl said.

"He wants to demolish it and put up one of those abortions on the site -
luxury housing," Whalen said, nodding to a new apartment building being
developed by Paul Stallings just east of the shul.

Rabbi Isaac Fried, a Brooklyn rabbi who said his grandfather's brother had
been the Eighth St. synagogue's rabbi, has been the squatter shul's
rabbi for the past few years. Fried got in Turkeltaub's face.

"You should be ashamed of yourself," Fried said.

"I should be ashamed?" Turkeltaub shot back. "What right do you have to go
in there?"

"Here's an old synagogue, over 100 years old," Fried said, speaking to a
reporter. "It's an historical place, with a hand-carved ark [the cabinet
where the Torah is contained]. There are Hebrew astrology mosaics on the
walls. The shul's been serving the needs of people, providing emergency
housing. We've put 20 people in housing around here."

Jim Sim, 40, Joseph's boyfriend, said when the Dos Blocos squat on E.
Ninth St. was evicted two years ago, the shul sheltered 12 of the
squatters. Monday night Narcotics Anonymous meetings are held there.

"My grandfather's brother was the rabbi here," Fried said. "I felt a
destiny, a calling, to help this synagogue survive. It's the last
surviving synagogue in Alphabet City. We don't care who really owns the
synagogue. We want it to continue functioning as a synagogue. They left
the building abandoned for so long. All the elements, the rain, the snow
were coming in. Now the neighborhood is gentrifying."

Fried said the shul is New York's only "tenement synagogue," meaning it
was built as a residential apartment building and a new front was added
to make it a synagogue.

Fried accuses Perl and the original congregation of "pulling a fast one"
by not telling the state Attorney General that the building housed a
functioning synagogue. The A.G. must approve all sales involving
religious properties.

Josephs said the shul's fate reflects changes in the neighborhood.

"In the East Village, we pride ourselves on being kind of unusual," she
said, "and these newcomers are really straight. The shul's not as
structured as we would've liked it to be. But at least we had an
opportunity. Now it's lost."

The case of possession of the shul, which was bogged down in court delays
for years, is currently at the Appellate Division. Fried says they'll
take the case to federal court if need be. But Perl says the shul's
lawyers have been disorganized and he feels the battle is over.

Fried earned notoriety and the nickname "The Pot Rabbi," last February
when he was arrested and charged with selling marijuana in Borough Park.
He's out on bail and awaiting trial. Fried says he was set up. "I was
[only] an advocate for the medical use [of marijuana]," he said,
stressing his arrest has no bearing on the shul issue.

After the Eighth St. Shul's members had drifted off, Perl's workers carted
out furniture and other items - a mattress a lamp, a Camel cigarettes
clock - which will be kept free of charge in storage for the shul, Perl
noted.

Turkeltaub lives on the Lower East Side in the Grand St. Coops where he
was head of maintenance for many years. He walked around inside the
synagogue, shaking his head at its state. The women's gallery upstairs
was piled with junk.

"Does this look like a place to hold services?" he asked.

Downstairs, a groove had been carved down the side of one of the Hebrew
zodiac murals for a thin water pipe and faucet.

"A water faucet, here?" he asked. He disdainfully picked up dusty Torah
covers that had been piled haphazardly on a pew. "Strewn around like
garbage," he said in disgust. Prayer shawls were casually draped over
the backs of the pews. There was no Torah in the arc.

Turkeltaub recalled when the synagogue used to pack in 400 people. But
older members passed on or moved to Florida and their children moved to
the suburbs, he said.

"I was the president, I was the janitor, everything," he said. "Believe
me, I put my heart and soul into this for 45 years. In the 1960s, we
used to have services here three times a day. Believe me, if this was a
legitimate congregation I'd have no qualms whatsoever."

In a prime spot just a half block away from Tompkins Sq. Park, the shul
will likely be converted to residences, like the far larger Cristadora
House on E. Ninth St. and Avenue B, a former settlement house that was
converted to luxury apartments.

Perl said because of zoning laws and height limits, he would actually lose
space in the building's rear if he demolished the existing four-story
structure and rebuilt, so it's more practical - as with many old
buildings on the Lower East Side - to convert the existing shul to
residential use.

"It was an attempted theft of a piece of property. And it was a scam,"
Perl said of the squatter shul. Perl wasn't moved by arguments that it
is Alphabet City's last remaining synagogue.